Ritual
by maebyfunkebluth
Summary: Oneshot set sometime after the season finale, but something is different. Veronica makes her way through one of her nightly routines. Warning, Contains Character Death. Also has some LoganVeronica. Kinda Angsty.


Ritual 

Every night Veronica would drag herself away from her soft bed, her air-conditioned room, and venture into the humid night. It was routine by now, the way she put pressure on exactly the right places on the floor so it wouldn't creak and give herself away, the way she knew how to muffle with her hand the sound the doorknob made, and the way she gently shut the door behind her, disturbing nothing.

She had stopped sleeping in pajamas a long time ago, necessity dictating that she wear street clothes, because it took that much longer for her to glide over to her closet and change. The summer air blew softly around her bare legs and shoulders, not quite enough to stifle the heat, but enough to make her shiver from the phantom touch. Her keys as always were in her pocket, she had discovered that bringing her bag along was too much work, and she gripped the piece of sharp metal in her fist as she made her way to the car, parked far away so that no one could hear the engine start.

The back of her legs stuck to the interior of the black car, and her hair blew in the wind that flew in the open window. She chewed her bottom lip, a nervous habit, because she could never quite escape the fear that someone would find her. She reopened a cut on her lip and warm coppery liquid filled her mouth. It was alright though, because she had learned to keep the medicine cabinet in her bathroom stocked with Chap Stick, Vaseline, Blistex.

The roads were almost always empty, barren of people and cars, but tonight a police cruiser was behind her. She could hear her heartbeat, at least ten times faster, her breath hitched and her hands gripped the steering wheel so tightly her fingers tingled from loss of circulation.

She mechanically turned the car down a side street, and when the police headed the other way she left out a small cry of relief. The roads were imprinted on her memory, and she barely had to think about where she was going anymore. This was a holy pilgrimage and the police had tainted it with their blue and red light and wailing siren.

Soon she had forgotten about her paranoia, because she was _there._ It wasn't anything special, because for some bizarre reason he had wanted to be here of all places. It wasn't a hard request for a random statement made in jest one evening when they were sitting around eating ribs, barbeque sauce smeared around their mouths.

"If I die, I want to be buried at Shark Stadium. They could even just prop my corpse up as some form of coat rack or decorative cup holder. But that would be a way to go. Maybe it would even get you to be interested in baseball."

For some reason when they asked about if her father had said anything in terms of burial or cremation that one moment had popped into her head, and she started laughing hysterically, at the fact that her father had made such a bad joke, and at the fact that she was actually going to go along with it.

The old stadium had been demolished and prepared for construction, but when Woody fled, it had pretty much decayed and now it was just a decrepit old lot. The ceremony consisted of her, Logan, Wallace, Cliff, and a handful of her father's old friends from his Sheriff days. She sprinkled her father's ashes on the dank and already y dusty ground and afterward she cried so hard that she vomited in a trashcan.

There had been a wake, but she didn't go. She stayed home and watched her dad's favorite stupid movies with Backup. Planes, Trains, and Automobiles, Groundhog Day, Galaxy Quest. She wore one of his old shirts and cried.

She cried now too. Kneeling on the dirty ground she sobbed and sobbed. Her nose ran and she knew she looked completely crazy. It didn't matter though, after all, what wasn't crazy about her dysfunctional wacky family?

She got back into her car and wiped her nose and eyes with a tissue. She wiped the grime from her knees, then licked her finger and rubbed a scrape from where she had knelt on a stone to get the blood off. She started the car and drove home.

She slipped back in, shut the door quietly, tiptoed to her room and curled up in a little ball next to Logan. She pulled the sheets over herself carefully, so she wouldn't wake him. Then, she closed her eyes and fell rapidly asleep.

When her breathing became even, Logan snaked his arm around her and pulled her close, wiping a bit of grime off her face. He held her tightly till he too fell asleep.

This was their ritual.

Please, please review! 


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